French canals 2013

Thanks Cardo, diesel looks a bit expensive at Port St Louis so will make sure that the tank is kept topped up. The water levels are nice and high at the moment, 1.7m at the pontoons at Vernonette, where we are now. Moorings are €1.50/m for the first night then €1.0/m for subsequent nights. There is electricity and water. The rest of the facilities are adequate but basic. Very helpful people and a Lidl a very short walk. I saw that the small port de plaisance at Les Anderlys was closed when we went past.
 
Just a quick update for today. We've made way towards Vitry. We had planned to do half the distance and stop at La Chaussee-sur-Marne at pk 14/15. Our guide book stated there was a mooring just upstream of the lock and the sign at Chaussee lock stated there was a halte nautique just upstream. Sadly, these were all lies! We passed what looked like may have been a small mooring once upon a time however the grass was fairly manicured and the bollards had been removed. As if to reinforce that it was no longer a mooring, someone had put tape across the edge of the bank to dissuade anyone from attempting to moor up. I think someone may have bought the adjacent house and decided this was now their private garden.
We continued on to Soulanges where, as per Grehan's website, there is a pleasant enough mooring with grass and picnic tables, however the very small village has _zero_ services.

As for the canal itself, this is still pretty full, however the current is near non-existent so progress is easy at little over tick over.
 
Further update:
We have arrived at Vitry-le-Francois. The marina is, uhm, small and somewhat busy. However, there are still two finger pontoons available that come with services. €10/night with services or cheaper for longer stays. €6 if you don't need services. We've moored up on the wall as we don't need services tonight. The entrance is pretty tight! The office is closed today and tomorrow, however according to the sign on the door the Canal de la Marne a la Saone is indeed closed and won't reopen until the 28th of May.
We're going to try and see if we can get our steering system sorted during the downtime. Vitry seems like a fairly industrial place with at least one major boatyard.

An addition to yesterday's info:
A few of the locks between Chalons and Vitry have some nasty cross currents just by the entrance. The worst one was Soulanges where even though I had a decent turn of speed to enter the lock, the current from the overflow on the right hand side, just by the entrance to the lock, was so strong that the boat veered drastically and we ended up scraping fenders on our port bow and aft starboard. We would've go in sideways had the lock been wide enough!
 
If you find the need for some temporary bodge to replace your hydraulic steering system which now I see the pics is looking pretty manky a steering rack from a car could be made to work. Extend or shorten the tie rods by welding and get the steering column and wheel too as a starting point for a temporary solution.
 
Cardo said:
Thought I'd provide an update as to our travels. We've arrived at Chalons-en-Champagne and are staying the night. Grehan, here's an update for your website:
There is a brand spanking new marina just upstream of the lock on the port side (right bank as per CEVNI rules). It's called Relais Nautique. There are 12 berths on finger pontoons with electric and water by each berth. The fees are €8 up to 10m or €10 for 10m and up (plus €0.40 per person per night tourist tax). The fees include water, leccy, wifi (pretty fast!) and use of the brand new loo/shower facilities. They also very kindly allow you to tie up for free for the night if you don't wish to use any services. Depth was around 2.something metres, not much more.
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I guess I will be Ok at 85cm ;)
 
Cardo said:
Further update:
We have arrived at Vitry-le-Francois. The marina is, uhm, small and somewhat busy. However, there are still two finger pontoons available that come with services. €10/night with services or cheaper for longer stays. €6 if you don't need services. We've moored up on the wall as we don't need services tonight. The entrance is pretty tight! The office is closed today and tomorrow, however according to the sign on the door the Canal de la Marne a la Saone is indeed closed and won't reopen until the 28th of May.
We're going to try and see if we can get our steering system sorted during the downtime. Vitry seems like a fairly industrial place with at least one major boatyard.

An addition to yesterday's info:
A few of the locks between Chalons and Vitry have some nasty cross currents just by the entrance. The worst one was Soulanges where even though I had a decent turn of speed to enter the lock, the current from the overflow on the right hand side, just by the entrance to the lock, was so strong that the boat veered drastically and we ended up scraping fenders on our port bow and aft starboard. We would've go in sideways had the lock been wide enough!
Click to expand...

Do you where the Canal is closed - any further update appreciated!
 
Paris Arsenal

Because of the height of the Seine at the moment most of the pontoons are full and we had difficulty persuading them to let us in. It was only that we have a broken throttle cable that swung it for us. Not many other places to moor as an option but there is a possibility of a couple of nights free mooring at the large Chinese restaurant a few kilometres upstream where some friends of ours stayed last year.
I'm following Cardo's progress with interest as we will be following on when we have a new cable.:)
 
bhangmaster said:
Because of the height of the Seine at the moment most of the pontoons are full and we had difficulty persuading them to let us in. It was only that we have a broken throttle cable that swung it for us. Not many other places to moor as an option but there is a possibility of a couple of nights free mooring at the large Chinese restaurant a few kilometres upstream where some friends of ours stayed last year.
I'm following Cardo's progress with interest as we will be following on when we have a new cable.:)
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Oh dear! It's not looking great at the moment, is it? And more rain is on the way!

We've returned to Chalons-en-Champagne and are staying here until the 27th as this place is _far_ nicer than the marina at Vitry. The marina at Vitry, I'm sorry to say, is just miserable. There's a few others here that seem to have the same idea as us. Nice views, location, facilities and good wifi! It's less than a day's worth of travel back to Vitry, so we'll head down on the 27th and get as far as we can in preparation for the canal reopening on the 28th.

The good news for you, bhangmaster, is that once you get onto the canals, you'll notice a massive difference with the sudden lack of currents. You'll first have to fight your way up the Seine and Marne for a bit, but once you're on the Canal Lateral de la Marne with its 8kph speed limit, you'll be happily cruising along at little over tick over.

The only thing I'd warn is the canals are very full and the overflows that tend to come out just before the entrances to the locks can be quite strong, pushing the boat sideways just as you're about to enter a very narrow lock!

On another note, we've seen a number of dead deer floating in the canal. What's that all about?!
 
Having poked around the, to be honest, quite awful search system on the vnf website, I have managed to find the notice in relation to the closure of the Canal de la Marne a la Saone, or Canal entre Champagne et Bourgogne as it's called now.
Link is http://www.vnf.fr/avisnet/avisDownload.do?aviNum=FR/2013/01124&lanCod=ENG

Essentially, the entire thing's closed, from the first lock at Vitry all the way to the lock where it joins the Saone. It reopens at 1900 hrs on the 27th of May, which means it won't actually open until 0900 hrs on the 28th of May. (Lock opening hours for plaisancers is 0900 hrs to 1800 hrs.)
 
Thanks for all the information Cardo, we are in Fecamp at present,having left Mean Feeling in Paris. We are meeting friends here who we hope have brought over a new cable from England.
 
I have been informed that the closure has been extended by a couple of days and the canal won't reopen until Thursday. Whether that means we can navigate on Thursday or we have to wait until Friday I am unsure as yet, I'll update once I know.

For now, we're staying put in lovely Chalons.
 
Andy and Lyn said:
good info - thanks Cardo.!!

Will plan on leaving Epernay on Friday! The automatic locks on the canal- are they "twist the pole" type and then push the blue pole up to operate sort! Looks like I'll be single handed for a few days so any info of that sort would be useful!
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The locks between Epernay and Vitry are definitely the twist the pole and lift the blue pole sort. If you're going to be single handed, I suggest you make sure you're well fendered up as there are some nasty currents upon entering some locks.

The locks on the Champagne - Bourgogne canal seem to be a mixture of remote box and manual locks, as per Grehan's page:
http://www.french-waterways.com/marne-saone.html
However, be aware the current closure seems to be for works to be done on the canal, so they may have updated some of the locks.

Speaking of the closure, I have located the latest chomage -
http://www.vnf.fr/avisnet/avisDownload.do?aviNum=FR/2013/02353&lanCod=ENG
Essentially, the works have overrun so the canal won't reopen until the 30th at 0700 hrs (0900 hrs for plaisancers).

The marina here at Chalons is starting to fill up. There's still a fair bit of space, but boats are arriving thick and fast. Well, sort of. Don't think they're all planning to head down south, but I'm guessing there'll be a fair few boats lined up to head down the canal when it does open. That'll be fun!
 
Cardo said:
. . . Don't think they're all planning to head down south, but I'm guessing there'll be a fair few boats lined up to head down the canal when it does open. That'll be fun!
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Sound thinking. There'll be a bunch of boats - including commercial peniches - wanting to come north too. You'll get some practice at being patient, and passing.
Wonder where you'll all meet up - Balesmes Tunnel, maybe! :)
 
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